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| Awesome roads everywhere in Belgium |
CX World Cup round number 5 of the season
in Zolder, Belgium was a full preview of the World Championships course at the
end of January….and I have to say that I’m really excited. The course is has a great mix of everything,
some fast straight aways, tight corners, sand, off cambers, roots, steep drops,
and some really cool history. Circuit
Zolder is an old F1 racetrack used in the 70s and 80s.
Christmas day was a cold, wet pre-ride of
the course. Wet, sandy muddy conditions
made the drivetrain unhappy within a single lap. There is an interesting combination of sand
and clay, enough sand to keep things together and enough clay to make it slick
and keep you on your toes. Though
Belgium has been having an unusually warm dry December and Boxing Day (race day)
proved to be warm and sunny, drying the course out throughout the day and
making it a very fast track.
Moving up to a fourth row call up, I had a
solid start, but I still have to learn to be a little more aggressive fighting
for spots with these European racers. Long
straight away on the track, and the field bottlenecked in the first hairpin
corner after about 200 m. Second hairpin
corner and through the pits, everyone is jockeying back and forth trying to
move ahead. Through a treed section, I
hopped off my bike to run a backed up corner and found myself being checked
left into USA’s Ellen Noble by a Rabobank rider, things were getting rough!
Through the pits and accelerate hard into a
tight, slick uphill hairpin corner. Two
lines here, if you can rail the corner hard enough and take the high line it’s
faster and smoother, but really hard to get to; most times I got shot to the
bottom and had to ride the mud to the off camber corner up to the
pavement.
First lap I’m sitting in pretty good company
and feeling somewhat comfortably uncomfortable.
The long sandy clayey shoot is relatively dry and fast, with a couple
good ruts. Hitting the bottom you have
about 100m to regroup then straight up a cliff.
If you’ve watched the past races this is a super steep cliff with steps
cut into the side…..this year they decided to move the track over a little and
there are no steps cut in, so it’s a free for all. Literally scrambling up, using my hands to
grab whatever I can while the front wheel if hitting the ground and the seat
hitting me in the head, throwing me totally off balance the whole way up. At the top there is another small run then a
short flat section to smack the sand out of your pedals, clip in and hump it up
the long steep climb….if you can ride you will definitely pass anyone
running.
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| Photo from William Beerland - going into the steeeeep run up |
Loose off camber corner, couple steep
little drops and a huge flyover back down onto the track to the finish
line. Lap 2, I managed to move into the
top 20, lap 3 I was apparently in 17th position……then just before
the long steep shoot I hear the dreaded “psst psst psst psst” of my tire
letting out all the air L (turns out to be a half inch cut in the side wall, nothing would
have saved that). I definitely let out an audible choice word and limp my way
to the pits. The steep downhills and
flyover are so sketchy trying to ride with a front flat and I almost end up on
my face 2 or 3 times so I decided running the drops was my best option….gaaaaah!!!! Loosing about 1 minute in lap 3 and at least
20 secs in lap 4 to just get to the pits, I move back in the high 30s/ low 40s…..and
I had my work cut out for me! Trying to
stay calm but make as much time as I can, I slowly pick off a rider here and
there and move up to finish in 33 place.
Definitely not how I wanted the day to end, but I am really happy with
how my body was feeling. Loved the IRC
tubeless Mud Seracs on my NoTubes rims at 23 psi on this track and was able to
rail the technical sections with ease!
Quick recovery and straight into my first
Superprestige the next day one of the oldest courses on the circuit, Diegem…aka
Cross Vegas of Europe. This is an
interesting course, using some tight cobbled roads, through some back yards and
a lot of features around a soccer pitch.
I made the full rookie mistake of putting Mad Alchemy Embro on my legs
(yummy) and then my chamois cream on……ouch!
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| Men's Race - that's Sven Nys!! |
Second row call up here, yippee!!!! I’m so close to those fast girls on the front
J. I have a good start up the
long road climb (though definitely not as good as fellow Canadian Anna
Schappert who came from behind to a top 10 before we hit the grass!!!), through
the first couple of corners and into the slick off camber that jams everyone up
and I find myself in the top 20. Around
the soccer field and past the pits we start to climb, first up and over a fly
over, around a corner and through an alleyway, then hitting the cobbles we turn
left and climb up a long climb (the TV definitely makes this look flat).
Short recovery at the top with some fun
singletracky corners and let the legs recover enough to hit the thick heavy
sand pit. There is sort of a beat in
track in the middle of the pit, the farther you go the less of a track it is,
and if you get off of it you sink another inch and stop dead. This effort really cooks the legs and if you
have to dismount and run, good luck getting clipped back in!! So much sand was jammed into my shoes and
pedals when I had to run that once I got in, I also had troubles getting out in
time for the barriers….that made it interesting a couple times J
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| Yaaay for Arcteryx waterproof gear |
Fast downhill on cobbles with some good
curbs to hop, and into the last couple greasy corners. I had a really good battle with the girls for
13th place, but plugged my front wheel in one of the final hairpin
corners and she got away. I was able to
make up some distance in the final mud put run into the stairs, but I didn’t
have the gas to close it on the final straight and finished in 14th. Pretty cool race with an unbelievable number
of people watching! It’s been said
before, but cyclocross is like the hockey of Canada, everyone pays good money
to get in and watch, they buy all the supporters gear, and make an evening out
of it drinking beer and eating meat on a stick, then they hit the disco tent
and things get crazy! Washing my bike in
the pits after the race was an adventure and I didn’t escape the crowd in my
little skinsuit without getting groped and kissed by some Belgians…..next time
I’ll leave my bike for Regan J
Couple recovery days, though when I went to
watch AzenCross in Loenhout I really wished I had raced!! Getting ready for the Sven Nys BPost in Baal
on Friday (New Years Day) and the Soudal Classic on Leuven on Sunday.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Years!!!!
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